Doctor’s Rebirth - Chapter 712

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 712
The next morning.
Screech. Whiiiing!
The staff moved slowly before striking out like lightning.
Just as I recreated a phantom horde with its mystical movements, it shifted to the subtleties of strength and flow.
I was alone in the training ground, practicing with my staff to experience my own transformation.
Strangely, I still wore the blindfold over my eyes.
Yet the staff advanced without any lack of precision.
My robes billowed outward.
The mystical staff dance continued.
Looking closer, it wasn’t a sword.
It was the staff I had borrowed for a brief time.
A pitch-black staff with no ornamentation whatsoever, merely elegant in line and solid in construction.
When my Master handed it to me as if he’d been waiting, I was amazed at how far ahead he must have foreseen.
It bore the marks of having been carved for quite a long time.
It fit perfectly with my height and stride.
I was astonished that it was neither too heavy nor too light, with the center of gravity perfectly balanced.
I continued to wield what had once been part of my body.
A staff made merely of wood produced a sound sharper than steel.
Given the restriction in place, I couldn’t use my inner energy.
And my inner energy hadn’t grown deeper either.
My inner energy was already in a pure and refined state. And it was quite different from my Master Jegalling’s.
I had entered martial arts through the Five Elements Qi Art, and afterward refined the Five Elements Divine Art alongside elixirs.
Then I learned the Yang Medicine Divine Art and became able to freely manipulate heterogeneous true qi.
Through the Gonggong Faction’s secret technique, the Unified Origin Single Qi Art, found in the Imperial Palace Secret Records, I achieved the unity of true qi.
‘After that, I learned the Boundless Heaven Martial Divine Art and the Five Elements Poison Art. I was even forced to take on the Cheonma Divine Art.’
Subsequently, I learned the Poison Dragon Divine Art and the Heavenly Dragon Art, the Immortal Divine Art, and even part of Shaolin Temple’s Muscle-Changing Scripture.
Just the inner energy cultivation methods alone amount to this much.
‘Finally, they’ve all melted into one.’
Unable to see, I instead focused inward on my body.
In the darkness, my touch, smell, taste, and hearing were honed to their limits, and at some point, I began to hear even the stirring and sounds of my own organs.
Next came the dantian.
Even though my Master temporarily imposed a restriction preventing me from using inner energy, he certainly didn’t seal the dantian itself.
I realized that a small universe dwelled in my lower abdomen.
Sensing my own small universe.
Without sight, there was no visual stimulus, so I did that instead.
Yet it was impossible to circulate my energy through the meridians.
That was the restriction.
So all I could do was merely sense it.
Yet that turned out to be a blessing in disguise.
‘The Five Elements Divine Art is a divine technique that unravels the principles of heaven, earth, and all things through the five elements. The Dual Will Divine Art divides one’s will into two. And then there’s the Primordial Unity Qi Art that unifies all things into harmony.’
It was wondrous.
As I continued to observe what my mind had grasped, they moved differently from what I had learned before.
‘Ah, it’s just like nature itself.’
Until now, I had believed that the Primordial Unity Qi Art, the Five Elements Divine Art, and the Dual Will Divine Art formed distinct layers within my dantian.
But when I felt it, it was different.
The Primordial Unity Qi Art became the Five Elements Divine Art.
The Five Elements Divine Art transformed into the Dual Will Divine Art.
Like a single cell differentiating in multiple directions, and sometimes being consumed by other cells, they differentiated, were consumed, and differentiated again.
Chaos.
Could it be that what I had always believed to be order could only exist in a world with light?
When I closed my eyes, only then did I grasp the truth of this microcosm.
It was chaos.
And what determined its boundaries was ultimately knowledge.
Yet that too felt as unstable as drifting on an endless sea.
‘So we believed that what we knew was everything. We didn’t even know where this qi came from or what power it possessed. We merely drifted, relying on ancient incantations.’
Falling into demonic deviation was inevitable.
We believed we knew what we did not know.
‘Even while not knowing where human will itself originates.’
Was that the emptiness the Abbot had perceived?
If so, then understanding it would grant even an ant the strength to move mountains.
What is intention?
Where does willful intention come from?
The Jegallim Family said that will comes not from the heart, but from the brain.
From a medical perspective, that was correct.
That was why Hyeonwon Jeondan Singeong belonged to the category of divine technique scholarship.
Yet something was strange.
If the brain were everything, how could a headless jiangshi use inner power?
Wasn’t martial arts ultimately created through will?
When I reached that point, I was seized by an irresistible impulse.
A feeling that I must wield something.
So I groped my way outside.
Bare feet pressed against soil. I felt an ant crawling and flinched, stepping elsewhere instead.
That was something I could never have done with my eyes open.
It was a small achievement.
I extended my staff, then withdrew it.
I extended it once more. I didn’t think about how it might appear.
After all, I was blind.
I simply swung, and swung, and swung, following the movement of the microcosm within my dantian.
Whoooosh—
Summer passes through, leaving handprints on my gaunt arms.
There, I feel the final breath of life itself.
It was the sound of a cicada dying. Simultaneously, it was the sound of another cicada being born years later.
In the light, a cicada is a pitiful creature that cries for only one season before vanishing, but in darkness, cicadas live their own lives beneath the earth.
That too was chaos invisible beneath the light.
I feel my inner force radiating outward.
Each time I perform the sword dance, the boundaries of my inner power scatter.
Energy and principle began to merge into one.
‘Ah, yes. This is what I wanted to do.’
It was a question I had pondered for a long time.
I desired true Hunwon.
Until now, I had merely clumsily created similar martial arts using the knowledge I had accumulated.
I realized I had not reached true Hunwon.
Hunwon must be stable.
Like small slime molds consumed by a massive slime mold.
Though consumed, it is not annihilation.
Within the massive slime mold, the small ones still live.
That was nature.
-Hunwon is nature.
One incantation begins and ends.
It was an incantation mine alone, and for the first time, without borrowing the Hyeonwon Jeondan Singeong, it emerged from my own contemplation of the microcosm within my body.
I began to understand why incantations contain so many metaphors.
Enlightenment can never be expressed in words.
To teach the story of darkness from the world of light, words must scatter and fragment.
I extend and retract again, moving the staff.
It is neither the ice crystal sword nor the wooden sword. It is merely that which guides the blind along their path.
At some point, it began to take on increasingly auspicious qualities.
Whiiiing!
Each time I swing the staff, the leaves around me swirl in its wake, beginning to sever themselves.
It was a military dance toward all under heaven.
At some moment, I realized that the seal my Master had placed on me naturally dissolved.
Within Hunwon, even the seal was consumed.
I tried to calculate why such a thing was possible, then gave up.
What I faced was chaos, and it was something to be confronted through the skin, not through the eyes.
‘This is absurd. So this is the end of the Hyeonwon Jeondan Singeong.’
Transcending heaven.
That is awakening to one’s own ignorance.
Understanding how shallow the realm of knowledge truly is.
A family that pursues wisdom must instead realize how fragile that wisdom is.
‘Gae Pa Josa truly….’
What made this remarkable was the realization that I now had to create my own secret formulae.
‘How distant it all seems.’
Though the martial arts of the Jegallim Family were complete in themselves, I began to understand why so few had ever mastered them to their fullest extent.
Finally, my robe billowed outward as the space around me began to split apart.
Dragon Wind.
I realized that I had created the Dragon Wind using only intent, without drawing upon my inner energy.
The essence and principles of all inner cultivation techniques ultimately converged into one, flowing through my being.
Unified beneath a single intent, it possessed a level of perfection rarely seen even in Gangho.
‘Miraculous.’
When we acknowledge what we do not know, we truly admit our ignorance.
That is when the real beginning starts.
‘Even if I perfect the Hyeonwon Jeondan Singeong, it has nothing to do with increasing my inner energy.’
That is the trap.
Because it completely transcends the conventions of Gangho, even the most gifted find it difficult to achieve mastery.
The answer I had arrived at, the answer Gae Pa Josa had arrived at—both were strange.
It was like being unable to see darkness when dwelling in a world of light.
Yet despite this, I could feel myself growing stronger than before.
When I extended my sword, there was no waste; when I stepped forward, there was no obstruction.
Sometimes I moved like water, sometimes like a tempest.
Everything flowed and circulated beneath my will.
This was the realm of perfecting the Hyeonwon Jeondan Singeong.
And the realm my Master Jegalling had entered long ago.
‘My Master must have already been able to wield intent freely.’
Just as an ant cannot see an entire human body from its perspective.
At some moment.
I realized my blindfold had come loose.
I could live with my eyes closed like this.
Was not the world of chaos just as fascinating as the world of light?
It did not seem like a bad choice.
For some reason, it felt as though I could become supreme under heaven even like this.
Having pushed sound cultivation to its limits and awakened to intent, vision might actually become an obstacle.
A strange certainty washed over me—that perhaps by abandoning sight, I could obtain power more easily.
It was an uncanny intuition that only one who had died before could possess.
But if I did that….
‘I would have to abandon surgery.’
As a doctor, I was not yet ready to set down my surgical blade.
The people I needed to save lived in the world of light.
My hesitation was brief.
I struggled to open my eyes.
‘It hurts.’
A piercing light seared my retinas, turning my vision white.
Descending from light into darkness was effortless.
But ascending from darkness into light always demanded a price.
Beyond the pain, I glimpsed my surroundings—devastated and barren.
Severed bamboo groves lay scattered across the landscape.
In that moment, my Master’s voice reached my ears.
“Magnificent.”
I startled and looked up to find my Master gazing down at me, his disciple.
Standing there with pure joy, he celebrated my achievement.
“Only now do I truly understand how deep the ocean is.”
“Did you perceive intent?”
“I could not perceive it—I merely sensed it through my skin.”
My Master smiled faintly.
“At least you will not lose in preliminary exchanges.”
It was an extraordinary compliment.
Not merely among those at my cultivation level, but spoken of the entire Gangho itself.
“I am fortunate.”
In martial contests, the offense and defense of preliminary techniques were crucial factors determining victory and defeat.
Direct exchanges of moves could not instantly eliminate an opponent.
But now, like my Master, I had reached a state where even if I could not win against an opponent, I would struggle to lose.
“Master.”
“Yes. Now that you have gazed upon the heavens, how does it feel?”
“I think I truly understand what ‘opening one’s eyes’ means.”
Opening one’s eyes.
Literally, it meant to open one’s eyes, but in Buddhist teachings, it also meant to achieve enlightenment.
“Indeed it is so. Few in our family’s history have truly perfected the Hyeonwon Jeondan Singeong. Those who reach this realm gain the ability to govern all under heaven.”
To govern all under heaven!
‘Seriously, Gae Pa Josa, there are so many more impressive-sounding terms you could use!’
In martial arts novels, there were phrases like “heaven and earth as one” or “unified with heaven and earth”—all these grand, magnificent-sounding expressions.
Truly, a supreme and distant realm!
‘Why did we have to settle for “govern all under heaven”?’
Gae Pa Josa?

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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